Broken Bonds: A Harry Potter Story
by sealord416
Summary: It is human nature to create bonds, both strong and weak. When bonds are broken it can be devastating to a person. However, for some the breaking of one set of bonds is the gateway into another, much stronger, bond. For one Harry Potter when his bonds break he is truly set free. (Powerful, Curious, and Heir Harry)


I do not own the Harry Potter franchise, all rights belong to J.K. Rowling, Warner Bros. Studios, and Random House Publishing.

In this world there appears to be few things that are constant and instead many that are not. But perhaps that isn't as true as we once believed. Perhaps the things that are most constant in our lives are the things that we can't see, like love, hate, and sadness. Among these unseen constants there is one that holds a slightly higher relevance. It has gone by many names; mana, chakra, natural energy, and most commonly, magic. It's in all of us, whether we are aware of it or not.

Magic is a force that few are born with the ability to access. It is passed down from parent to child, and sometimes manifests itself without warning in an individual. No one knows what dictates this ability, though many have tried to understand it. Only one thing is for certain, with magic inside you, you are linked to countless individuals, and you are never truly alone.

Alone. That was the word that a certain boy had decided best described him. Of course if he ever told anyone that he was sure that they would stare at him with utter bemusement. He a had a perfectly wonderful, happy, and loving family didn't he? He couldn't possibly have any want or desire that they couldn't provide for. That, of course, is where they would be wrong. As a matter of fact he had never experienced those things from his so called family, and likely never would.

The boy's name is Harry Potter. To most he was a quiet boy who much rather preferred to stay hidden than to interact with anybody. Whenever he was introduced it was always followed by the words, "He doesn't say much." Not that he would be allowed to even had he wanted to, the Dursleys made very sure that he was always aware that he was, "Not to say a bloody thing if he could help it."

The Dursleys were Harry's only living family. His parents died in a car crash when he was barely a year old and he was 'mercifully' taken in by his aunt and uncle. His Aunt Petunia was a skeleton of a woman, she had a horse-like face with sharp darting eyes and a giraffe length neck, which, Harry supposed was well suited for all of the spying that she did on the neighbors. His Uncle Vernon was an entirely different story. Built in much the same fashion as a walrus and with a mustache to match his uncle was a rather… large man to say the least. He sold drills for a living and as a result was used to being in a position to bully people into doing anything, after all, how else was he to sell drills of all things?

The final true member of the Dursley family was Harry's cousin Dudley. Dudley was a lot like his father, by which of course is to say he was a small, beady eyed, pig of boy who got what he wanted when he wanted it. He was spoiled to the point of royalty and had never once in his life had to compromise on anything, his parents made sure of that. As if that wasn't bad enough he seemed to have only one goal in life; to torment Harry. He had rather succeeded on that part by making sure that Harry had no friends to speak of, adding to the loneliness that was Harry's life.

It may seem odd that such a family could possibly be anything but a normal, happy family. However, what happens in the privacy of one's own personal life is often largely different from the public facade. The Dursleys, though it was only Vernon and Petunia, hated anything that seemed even a little bit abnormal, odd, or strange. There seemed to be no reason for this hatred but unfortunately for young Harry, he was the epitome of all three.

Odd things tended to happen when Harry was around including a strong gust of wind pushing him onto the roof of his school, his hair growing back overnight after being unwillingly shaved off, his teacher suddenly tripping over nothing after making fun of him. Yes there was a large list of odd things that happened around the young boy. Perhaps strangest of all however, was the thought it almost seemed like his guardians knew why the odd things happened and furthermore believed he could control the happenings. As if he were somehow responsible!

Harry off course couldn't fathom why on earth they thought that. He was just a normal boy, he had lost his parents before having a chance to meet them but surely that wasn't too unusual, and the odd happenings around him were fairly common he was sure, other children could just control them like the Dursleys wanted him too. Oddly enough however, the Dursleys seemed to harbor particular hatred of his parents, which made even less sense than their dislike of him. His mother was his aunt's sister after all. What was more important than family? Family. That was something that Harry had desperately yearned for from a young age. No matter how much time he spent with the Dursleys he knew they would never be his real family, though he clung on to the hope that maybe one day they would suddenly accept him as their own son, and everything would be wonderful.

He held on to that hope until a week before his eleventh birthday…

Albus Dumbledore sighed and leaned in his desk chair looking at the paperwork before him. As old and powerful as he may be there was one thing he was certain of; he would never defeat the paperwork that came from running a school. Of course there was less during the actual school year itself, and not too much during the summer, but somehow it always managed to pile up by the time August rolled around. That was partly due to his own tendency to procrastinate, which given the amount of jobs he had it was somewhat astonishing that he could find the time to procrastinate at all. Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore was known by many titles. He was the Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, The Chief Warlock of the Ministry of Magic, The Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Veneficus Magnum of the Order of Phoenix,Order of Merlin First Class, Defeater of Grindelwald, Leader of Light, a Lord of the Lower House, and an extraordinary lover of sweets.

His main occupation these days was as a Headmaster more than anything else. Rather ironically, it was this job, which should've been the easiest of his tasks, that was currently bringing him the largest amount of stress. Every year the school owls were sent out to deliver the school supply list for the returning students and a welcome letter to the new students. At the end of the welcome letter was a line for the prospective student to sign to confirm their admission and upon doing so their signature would also appear on a master list of students next to their printed name. It was one name in particular that was giving Albus such a problem. He had sent hundreds, if not thousands of letters to the family and had yet to receive a response. He had even told the owls to find them no matter their location, in the off chance that the family was off on vacation somewhere and hadn't been receiving the letters sent to their home address.

After receiving no reply yet again Albus was more bemused than ever. He couldn't just let this student pass on enrolling at Hogwarts, he was certain the parents of said students would haunt him for years if he did. There was really only one option at this point, he'd have to send someone. It wasn't a trivial matter either since he really needed his full staff with him to prepare for the coming school year, half of them had yet to even get their curriculum for the upcoming year approved and they were hardly a month away from the first day of school!

After a few minutes more of internal debate he had come to a decision, and a rather good decision he should think. He would send someone likable, trustworthy, kind, and more importantly, they already were fond of the prospective student. Yes, no one was more suited to the task then Rubeus Hagrid.

*Earlier that week*

"Hurry up with those eggs, boy!" Uncle Vernon called for what seemed like the twentieth time.

"Yeah I'm starving over here." came Dudley's pitiful whine, as if he hadn't already had four of the darn things.

Harry rolled his eyes and sighed, no other person could possibly consume the amount of food in a day that Dudley had in one meal. Already he had eaten four eggs, ten slices of bacon, three pieces of toast and four large pancakes, it was no wonder he was so bloody fat. Of course he kept these thoughts to himself, it wasn't worth him missing his own breakfast, (meager as it would be), just to get in a few scathing remarks.

Bringing over the next plateful of eggs Harry sat down and began to take what little food remained from the onslaught of his uncle and cousin. So naturally that was when his uncle heard the post being delivered.

"Dudley go and fetch the post." he stated.

"Dad I don't want to, make Harry do it."

"Boy, go get the post." he said, not even bothering to look up from his plate.

"Make Dudley do it" Harry grumbled.

Uncle Vernon took a moment to glare at Harry, "Now." he growled.

Harry begrudgingly drug himself from his chair and walked out of the kitchen, muttering a string of curses the whole way. Why should he have to do it just because Dudley didn't want to? Dudley was nothing but a fat, greedy, spoiled brat who got anything he wanted! The injustice of it all made him want to rage about, but, as always, he restrained himself.

Stooping down he gathered the pile of letters by the door and began sifting through them on his way back to the kitchen. Coming upon a particularly thick letter he was surprised to see his own name on the letter. It read:

 _Mr. H Potter_

 _The Cupboard Under the Stairs_

 _4 Privet Drive_

 _Little Whinging_

 _Surrey_

There was no return address listed but the envelope had a wax seal embossed with an odd crest on it. It appeared to be four animals with a large letter H in the center. What was more curious however, was that whoever had sent the letter knew he was forced to sleep in the cupboard under the stairs.

Returning to the kitchen Harry gave his uncle the other letters, his uncle not even bothering to look up from his newspaper. Still focused on the oddity in his own hands Harry decided the best course of action was to simply open it. Just as he was deciding this Dudley chose to open his mouth, which as usual, meant nothing good for Harry.

"Dad Harry stole a letter!" he squealed grabbing the letter from Harry's hands.

"Hey! Give that back it's mine!" Harry yelled trying to grab the letter back to no avail. Before he could make another grab for the letter Dudley had passed it to his father.

"You?" Uncle Vernon scoffed, "Who on earth would be writing to you?"

He examined the back of the letter for a moment before turning it over. Then his face began to change color in the most spectacular of ways. It quickly went from a ruddy red color, to a strained purple, and finally to the palest white imaginable.

"Petunia!" he yelled, his face returning to the strained purple, " Petunia come in here now!"

"Vernon what on earth is the matter?" Petunia snapped, she was not a fan of yelling (The neighbors might hear them for goodness sake!)

Vernon didn't say anything but merely handed the letter to her, his hand slightly trembling. It hardly took a moment of looking at the letter before Petunia's face turned pure white. She shared a glance with her husband before turning to the two children present.

"Boys," she said with a deceptive calm, "Go into the other room for a bit."

"I wanna stay mom," Dudley began to whine, "I wanna know what's in the letter."

"Not right now honey, go into the other room." She replied sternly, for maybe the first time ever.

"NO! I want to stay!" Dudley yelled, beginning one of his "tantrums"

"THAT'S ENOUGH!" Vernon yelled, "LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER!"

Dudley quailed. Not once in his life could he remember his father yelling at him. With hurried steps he and Harry fled from the kitchen into the next room. While it wasn't uncommon for Harry to be yelled at and punished neither of them could think of a time when Dudley had been treated in such a way.

"What's in the letter?" Dudley asked looking at Harry

"How should I know? I didn't get to open it, remember?" Harry said glaring back

"I dunno, maybe you already knew what it was."

"If I already knew what was in the letter then why would someone bother sending it to me?" Harry sighed, sometimes his cousin was just flat out stupid.

Harry and Dudley had been waiting for what seemed like forever, eventually Dudley had gotten bored and turned on the telly. Harry would've joined him but his curiosity had won out and instead he sat at the door trying to hear into the kitchen. The best he got was a few murmured words, never a whole sentence.

Eventually the talking stopped and Harry quickly moved away from his spot at the door. He didn't want to get caught eavesdropping again, getting caught would mean no dinner for a week, or at least that is what had happened the last time he got caught.

A minute or so later Vernon came through the door, and without a word to the two waiting boys he sat down on the sofa and began to read his newspaper. From in the kitchen the sounds of Aunt Petunia washing up the breakfast dishes could be heard.

For the rest of the day Harry thought about the letter, when he wasn't doing chores of course. The main thoughts had been on the contents of the letter. Being someone who had never received a letter before Harry really had no idea what to expect. It obviously wasn't some kind of bill or advertisement, whoever had written the letter obviously knew Harry somehow, they had even known he was stuck sleeping under the stairs in that nasty cupboard.

It was then that Harry's mind had gone to work. Contrary to the popular belief Harry wasn't stupid, he just wasn't allowed to be smarter than Dudley. Of course that meant he had to portray himself as dumber than rocks, but if it kept the Dursleys from bullying him then it was worth it. So the truth was that Harry was rather brilliant, he had a quick mind that seemed able to make connections between concepts that most others couldn't make, or couldn't understand. His teachers thought it was amazing, the Dursleys didn't.

Harry made quite a few connections when it came to the letter, although most of them just brought up more questions than they answered. For one, these people had been watching the Dursley family, or maybe just him specifically. There was no other way for them to know about where he slept. The next thing he realized is that whoever it was must have some kind of title, as only nobles would put a family crest on a letter. The script on the letter also appeared to be written with a fountain pen, or some sort of old writing utensil which furthered the belief that some noble would have sent it. What other kind of person would use an old way of writing just to look fancy?

Those few things brought forth several new questions. Who would spend time spying on the Dursleys? How had they avoided being seen? Was it some long lost relative? Why did it bother the Dursleys so much? Would he get to read it? Why did they want to watch the family? Just the general experience of being near the Dursleys was enough to make Harry disgusted, and that was without watching them constantly. More importantly why would they care enough to do so. And also, what on earth would a noble want with him? He was, after all, just Harry. Nothing special.

Who would've thought one letter could bring so many questions, or so much trouble.

The letters came without end that week. After receiving upwards of a hundred letters Uncle Vernon took a board and his drill and covered the mail slot on the door. That didn't really accomplish anything though because the letters seemed determined to get in the house no matter what. Aunt Petunia found them inside every egg she cracked, Dudley found them in the bottles of morning milk, and Uncle Vernon even found them in his morning newspaper.

That wasn't even the strangest part, no, the strangest thing was that the letters all appeared to be delivered by owls. Harry had noticed that before Uncle Vernon had boarded up the mail slot the owls would swoop in, release the letter, and fly away and land somewhere on the house. It was almost as if they were waiting for something.

This went on until Sunday, that was when things got a little, interesting. They were sitting in the living room at the time, well at least the Dursleys were sitting, Harry was serving them tea. During a lull in the conversation Uncle Vernon decided to speak, much to Harry's displeasure.

"I love Sundays you know. Best day of the week in my opinion. Do you know why that is Dudley?" He asked, almost merrily

Dudley shook his head, bit thick that one.

"Because there's no post on Sunday" Harry said sourly

"Right you are boy, no post on Sunday" he said with a laugh

Famous last words.

It started with a low rumbling sound, almost like the sound of a thousand pages turning. Then a single letter shot out from the fireplace, right past his Uncle's face. There was silence for almost a minute. Then chaos erupted as thousands upon thousands of letters came streaming down the chimney, blasting into the room. Dudley and Aunt Petunia were screaming while Uncle Vernon bellowed like a wounded bull. Harry danced around trying to grab a letter out of the air. He snatched one and bolted for his cupboard, Uncle Vernon crashing after him. He almost made it.

Sprinting out into the front hall toward his cupboard Harry could barely believe what was happening around him. All he could think about however, was reading that letter. Amidst the chaos the board over the mail slot had come off and the letters came shooting out of it with just as much fury as in the living room. Unfortunately that didn't deter Uncle Vernon from grabbing Harry and taking the letter from his grasp. A brief struggle between them ensued, which Harry promptly lost. Dudley and Aunt Petunia hovered nervously at the edge of the hall as Uncle Vernon uttered those fateful words.

"That's it! We're going! We'll go far far away, far enough that they'll never find us!"

And Harry's hopes came crashing down.


End file.
